Lol the whole point of the killing joke was that Joker was an unreliable narrator. The whole multiple choice and it takes one bad day doesn’t change here. The comic if anything reassures his origin. But you clearly didn’t understand the killing joke.

@VicSav Lol how about you go read Killing Joke again instead of defending this shitty comic on every single person's review who didn't give it a positive rating.

^ didn't want to be mean to him when he was name calling and being super snobby under my review. But all he seems to do is treat this comic like the second coming of christ, despite the fact that it's almost like people have different opinions

But you stated something wrong, you said he wasn't an asshole before the one bad day in killing joke, but the comic explicitly said to not to trust joker as a narrator, hence the multiple choice. So he was never meant to be telling the whole truth, they even explored it in The dark knight movie, the Joker movie, cuz it came from killing joke the idea of unreliable narration by Joker. You can dislike the comic but saying something wrong isn’t gonna help form an objective opinion.

He never claimed that he wasn't an asshole. Clearly that's established here as a retcon. What he said was that idea invalidates the entirety of Killing Joke, which it clearly does. It ruins the one bad day idea that Moore introduced in that book. It's basically saying that the Joker was always sinister and evil, when the whole point of Killing Joke is that anyone can turn into the Joker, all it takes is one bad day.

Also it ruins the multiple choice origin for the Joker by basically confirming that yes he was married to someone and was going to have a child. Mystery solved I guess. The Joker has no mystery behind him anymore. That's a good thing I guess? In my opinion, having the Joker have an unconfirmed origin was one of the best things about him

Nah, he wasn’t evil before that, he had signs of it, he wasn’t having a healthy relationship so he lied about it and that one bad day completely transformed him to it, made him go all out and embrace who he is. Three jokers said he was kind of abusive to them and they didn’t want to be part of that family. It doesn’t say he was evil or an asshole, it was just that he wasn’t true to what happened. They just wanted to dump him.

Jokers "one bad day" was ALWAYS BS and hes been proven wrong on it many mant times including in TKJ. He tried to do the same thing to Gordon and it DIDNT WORK. Joker was never an innocent victim, he made bad decisions and did bad things long before that vat of acid.

They are teasing a more sadistic Joker, the whole three jokers was to play mind games with Batman, and help build his legacy but the comedian has now healed Batman through Chill and so now wants to be the only pain and the deepest pain he can feel. I love the the idea that joker hates not being the main source of Batman deepest pain, so much so that he helps Batman find closure, and heal that wound. This is next level sadism by Joker and that’s a genius/clever idea. Builds up for the future.

Also I don’t get how does he make sense to compare Hickman run on Xmen to this 😂. That’s like comparing GL run with this self contained story.

The Joker was already sadistic to begin with, we didn't need another story to show how sadistic he is. And I'd say that the Joker has done much more to harm Batman in other stories than in this story. Batman as a character hasn't even changed from beginning to end of this story. No character even goes through any changes in this story, which is why it's so unremarkable. Also the comparison was using Hickman's Avengers, and it was a metaphor that might have gone over your head.

I used it to say that there are ways to tell an interesting story and then put the toys back in the playbox which is what this 3 jokers book was. Nothing changed in Batman mythos from before the book than after the book ended. You can change up story telling conventions and tell an interesting story, but for me this story was just basic Batman and Joker duality story. Wow, we haven't gotten that before in any story right?

How does the fact Joker wife and son still alive not change the mythos or future of Batman? How does him healing and forgiving Joe Chill in his last moments (which gave him full closure) and putting it behind his back not adding anything. Also the fact Jason is thinking about healing and moving on from Red Hood is something different. Also didn’t he finally kill joker?Isn’t that adding to the mythos? Also wanting to heal with someone but lacks the strength to heal independently is strong writing

But this next level sadism adds to the joker lore. Also what makes joker so sadistic are these moment in comics, spitting the word sadistic around is more than just a word, you have to earn it and this joker earned his sadism by healing Batman (which adds to the mythos of who actually healed him). Wanting to be his biggest and deepest pain.That’s 100% Joker and that’s how he should be written giving reasons why he’s the baddest and alpha evil, saying a guy is sadistic isn’t enough.

Oh the fact this Joe Chill actually has a reason why he killed Batman parents is adding to the lore. Originally it was thought that it was a random guy that thought it was cool to kill two parents which makes no sense whatsoever, it was so random obviously he had a good reason to kill and let the kid live. It has to add up, and this book offers that. It’s an interesting new take, it’s a realistic take. You can hate it but saying this comic added nothing to the lore is bs.

Joker's wife and son being alive will not have any impact on the DC universe whatsoever, and it shouldn't have an impact on the Batman at all. They are characters that do not matter in the grand scheme of things. I said in my review that him forgiving Joe Chill is cool, but it is unoriginal. He did that exact same thing in many other media including other comics.

Jason looking to move on from Red Hood has been explored so many times as well in Red Hood series, in Batman series. And let me tell you why it won't happen. It won't happen because DC knows that the Red Hood concept sells, which is why Jason will always resort to Red Hood. And how is this next level sadism from Joker? He wants to be Batman's greatest pain? That was already clear ever since Joker killed Jason the first time.

Also it’s clearly a sequel to killing joke and previous books. It’s not supposed to be completely different. If Geoff Johns completely changed the mythos people will eat him alive and say that didn’t happen, that’s silly and fan fiction, it’s forced and so on. So adding to the lore is a hot take lol. Also the fact this Batman for once in his life is a good parent and isn’t just an asshole is a breath of fresh air lol.

Batman already has been facing his demons with the Joker for decades and it has been clear in numerous stories that Batman and Joker will always be a duality. Why do we need another story to show that the Joker is Batman's top archenemy/problem/pain? How does that change Batman as a character? And Red Hood killing the Joker? Cool, there's a Joker still alive at the end of the story.

If there were no Jokers alive at the end of the story, or if Batman was able to overcome his obsession with the Joker or their connection, that would have worked so well. I'll reference Arkham Knight, which is not the best Arkham game, but it handles the Joker/Batman relationship so well. Batman is able to overcome Joker's obsession and lock Joker away from his mind forever, overcoming one of his greatest fears. That is how characters should progress, not just the same thing happening

So the fact that the joker can find out about his kid and wife isn’t interesting 😂 or his son can become a hero or turn a villain by Joker is not an appealing idea lol, to me it has a lot of potential for the future of dc do they ever decide to capitalize on it. Who you kidding. It adds a lot of promise, and impact on the future of dc if they go with it. But hey let’s shut down every interesting idea that can come with this because I can’t think myself.

So you want a story about jokers not to be about Batman but rather him moving on from joker 😂. Boy you should never write a comic.

Cool I guess that's your opinion. In my opinion, the Joker having a son who can become a hero is a really dumb idea. And it has been done in the past that a villain's son/offspring is a hero. And making them into a big deal just ruins the mystery surrounding the Joker. Obviously from a money perspective, the idea of oh my god the Joker's son is alive? We gotta tell a story about him. But from a creative standpoint? that idea doesn't have a lot of merit in my opinion.

Joker Killing Red hood isn’t the sadest part of his life, it’s his parents death that still haunts him, and it’s in every freaking book where he never moves on from his parents death and they do it perfectly here. He’s no healed because he’s done with Joe Chill and he’s in peace with him, that’s what always haunted him and what made him fear. Not red hood, he’s still alive and killing people that’s just one level, what this comedian did is genius and clever, he won after all. Now it’s all him.

And to your last point about Batman moving on from the Joker? Yes I'd love that. I read fiction, not just comics in general, to see story progress and move forward. Why do I want to keep seeing him fight the Joker? When I know at the end of the day the Joker will just escape and live to harrass Batman again. If you want a realistic take as you claimed above, Jason would have killed the Joker at the end as well. I would have liked that more than the ending of this series.

Is it bad for me to want Batman to move on from the Joker? The Joker is an overused character that DC knows sells, so he will be in as many Batman stories as possible. Ironically if they shelved the Joker for a couple years or killed him for a couple years, his story of his return would probably sell more than the stories that they keep telling about the Joker.

But this is three jokers story, how can he move on from the joker? If he killed him, he will be haunted by it forever, he can never escape the joker. That’s the point, that’s why he’s his greatest nemesis. DC can do stories without joker, this story will have no impact on the fact joker will never be used, this book will be too silly and overlooked if that’s why it’s saying lol. It’s contradicting cuz it’s all about the history of the two villains.

But in this story he moved on from Joe Chill. That’s great progress for Batman lol. Are you saying he will forgive joker for the things he did and move on? That makes no sense. The fact dc can use any villain has nothing to do with joker being his greatest or not. Every hero has his greatest villain. It’s not a new concept.

Batman should not kill the Joker. That should be reserved for Jason or be totally out of Batman's control. I never said that Batman should kill the Joker. This story would have worked so much better if the Joker died is what I'm saying. Provide some finality to this Batman joker duality and never ending battle. They've been at it for nearly 100 years. If you want to keep reading joker stories for the next 100 years without an end in sight then good for you, that's your opinion.

That's why when jason killed the first joker, I was very happy he did so. Its the one major thing Jason has done since he has been back and killing joker might allow him to move on from that dark spot in his life

So you’re saying kill joker for good? Sorry for saying this but are you dumb?

Yes, I'd love it if DC had the guts to kill the Joker for good or at least a decade. Why do we need so many joker stories? In the past year we've gotten Joker in dozens of stories. Yes he is an important character, but characters can get overused.

Let people miss the joker or let writers have time to come up with better stories with the joker. Killing him or shelving him for a couple years would allow for that. And it would allow for Batman and the Bat family to progress their characters away from the just more joker after joker story

From what you’ve said it sounds like you’re sick of the Joker, which is fine. Just don’t read stories about him. He’s not in every DC story let alone every Batman story, he’s easy to avoid. Yeah he’s in the black label a lot but most the stories he’s in are good. It was obvious they weren’t going to kill him in this when the artist said it could be canon.

True, the black label stuff has been good. Can't deny that. What I mean by joker oversaturation is what's been going on in the main Batman title, this title, Justice League when it was written by Snyder, Death Metal, Dark Knights Metal as well. Even in doomsday clock, Joker played a role in that. And that's the problem is that DC comics seem to rely on the Joker always being part of Batman stories, which is a problem

They should give any other villain a boost. Besides the Joker, the most recent villain that's gotten a huge boost was Bane in Tom King's run

I see what you mean. I do think after the disappointing joker war and this story joker should have a few years break for underrated villains like mad hatter but nothing as long as a decade.

Yes, my ideal Batman run would work more along the line of Detective where arc would alternate between new and old villains. 6 issues to tell a story for an old villain, while using the next 6 to introduce a new villain or a new story for Batman. So that will keep the reader guessing as to who the next Batman villain or story is. If you keep using the same villain over and over again, with the same story basically, it does get repetitive and readers start to drop books

Never had a plan for Rebirth indeed. So true. I remember loving and being so excited by DC Rebirth Special and each of the promising new arcs that were clearly meant to spin out of it. Well, I re-read it after reading this issue and was flabbergasted that not a single thing in that comic book resulted in anything at all, apart from that dang button. (Remember Diana's brother Jason? Yeah, me neither.) Literally nothing came from that Special apart from the utterly disappointing Doomsday Clock.

You know what, I'm offended that you would compare those movies to Young Justice. And I thought maybe mockery would get my point across. You know, "You're pretty judgy for someone who liked White Knight" or "Unlike the Joker, the villain Loki genuinely grew and redeemed himself as a character when there were no easy pills to swallow." I gave a tinge of a thought to actually doing a real nerdy thing and explaining the character arcs for the major Avengers through the course of those films.

But I know and you know that that wouldn't convince anyone. And you may be asking why I would waste my time responding to someone who I don't even disagree with beyond a digression used to lengthen a review for a book that didn't really deserve that much thought. And I would respond by saying that I have plenty of time to kill because there's no Avengers movie in theaters.

Fair enough, to each their own, I guess. Albeit White Knight is awesome. My broad point was, the comic is an empty spectacle wasting reader's time in a way similar to big team ensemble movies where barely any characters develop at all. With such a diverse and big cast as Young Justice has, I'm really triggered none of them really developed in the span of 15 issues. Bendis' thrown some key personality traits for them and does nothing to explore them, or something besides them. No substance.

Bendis used to write a good team book, but he's just gone very downhill over the years. Case in point, his Avengers runs. When he first showed up, it was crazy. He turned the title into a bestseller. That was in 2004 with Avengers Disassembled. By the time his final run was announced, I want to say that was in 2010 during the Heroic Age initiative, you could audibly hear boos from the crowd. Now, it's been 10 years since then, and I can tell you he wasn't just burnt out on Avengers.

DC wanted 2004 Bendis. The reputation he's ridden since then. But they got 2018, 2019, 2020 Bendis. I don't know why they signed him. His sales on his final Marvel comics were slumped and his critical reception was low. My only guess is that they were hoping he could create new characters to reinvigorate the line.

And that would be awesome. I mocked Jinny Hex a lot, but she has genuine potential to become a good character. Same with Teen Lantern, heck, I actually think she may even be this run's bright new star, I love the concept of bootleg Lantern powers! But instead of focusing on the team and developing new faces, we've got... Drake. I'll be damned, first Rick Grayson, then Drake, oh, and there was an Ian Wayne... you either die a Robin or live long enough to see yourself become bastardized.

I feel like it would be better to compare them to all of the MCU rather than just the Avengers movies. Especially since 2 of the 4 Avengers movies are actually pretty good. The humour of the MCU in general though makes a horrible death seem like an appealing alternative.

Teen Lantern has, so far, had a pretty similar trajectory to that of Riri Williams aka Ironheart over at Marvel. Bendis invented her as this child prodigy who was able to become a superhero with their technical abilities, but he hasn't done anything with it. So now, if the trajectory stays on track, Teen Lantern will be shoehorned into an event where other more established characters will vouch for her, and then she'll be given a huge spotlight for a while.

Which Bendis will ultimately do nothing with, and you'll probably get a lot of complaining. And then once Bendis has used up the character completely, a better writer will come along and finally help them reach their potential.

And I was assuming that Nihilist was referring to the whole of the MCU, but even if they just meant the Avengers movies specifically, my comments still stand. Either way, those movies are definitely driven by the characters and their arcs. If they weren't, the premise of an interconnected universe with a big finale like Endgame would mean fuck all. You want to compare a movie franchise to Young Justice, I suggest Transformers. Specifically the fourth one with Marky Mark.

Yup, gruesome death indeed sounds like a better alternative than listening to even one MCU "joke". To this day I shiver with disgust and cringe when I remember the shameless Star Wars promotion in some of these movies, especially the Spidey scene in Civil War. Awful, awful, awful.

I could also agree with Riri Williams reference, albeit TL didn't invade a foreign nation (yet) and she surely doesn't exist to replace anyone, since the GL corps is vast and diverse. I wouldn't object if she was featured as a younger sister-like character to someone like Jess, Kyle or maybe even Simon, since no one cares about the poor guy and maybe he would finally have anything to do, lol.

Wait, that's the example you choose as an indictment of the MCU? Huh. I'm a fan of those movies and I could've picked something much better. As for the humor thing, it's subjective, but I do notice a pattern amongst those who complain about the humor in the MCU. They tend to have this fringe humor that is mostly unsatisfied, in general. They find the quirkiest things funny. They get more out of a meme than a real joke. I don't know if that fits everyone but I do see it as a trend that I can mock

The foreign nation bit comes after the after the big event appearance. I don't think Bendis wants to make her anyone's sidekick. Seems pretty antithetical considering she's on the Young Justice team.

Dude. MCU is just a meh level popcorn flick and this book is exactly like that: good to look at with an ass ton of characters, but no story and narrative.

The basis for the comparison is just inaccurate. If you think the comparison is apt, I can't convince you otherwise, but it does make me write off your opinion a bit.

Nihilist you'll have to excuse Tom King for all the unaddressed plot threads left hanging, and every detail he has overlooked. ...he was too busy patting himself on the back for being so clever, and eating a cucumber sandwich.

Of course. And he got this sandwich at Porky's, let's not forget that!

hahahaha! he was awarded a year supply of cucumber sandwiches when he signed up for the Fall Out Boy fan club. :D

so this is the second time DC has killed Alfred in the comics, right?

You mean in main continuity @myconius? Because I remember in main continuity he died long time ago in 60's smashed by a rock when saving the life of the Dynamic Duo and then soon returned as a very weird rogue named The Outsider. In Dark Knight Returns Alfred dies at the end. And recently he died in Injustice killed by Zaz for Superman order. And maybe there are another 1 or 2 times outside main continuity but right now I don't remember at all.

@Detective Chimp - yeah. in the main continuity. he sacrificed himself to save Brice & Dick, and was replaced by Aunt Harriet, then due to Alfred's popularity they just brought him back. i suspect somewhere down the road DC will be widdling Alfred being alive back into continuity, after they're done trying to capitalize on ALFRED R.I.P. ..not sure if i want to actually waste $4.99 on that.

Yo they killed Alfred ?

The execution is poor. By keeping Alfred a secret, there is no building of suspense. Instead of intense nervousness, we get a huh? The death won’t stick. Or I could be wrong.

Precisely. As often with King, it's shock for the sake of shock. Hope the next writer will retcon his crap.

don't worry. writers like Peter Tomasi have had to clean up after worse messes than this. Batman will be on another mission to some other supernatural world to resurrect Alfred. ....everything Tom King does just feels like a cheep gag. who the hell actually falls for this crap?

Or it gets ignored. I mean Kings run doesn’t fit at all with Year of the Villains,Alfred is alive in Doomsday Clock& Detective Comics also ignores it. With a better writer it could have been a great story, but King isn’t talented enough.

With a better writer it was a great story. it was called Knightfall by Chuck Dixon. a real comic writer. not this fly-by-night shoemaker.

True.

It’s so awful, that trash describes it best.

bloody maggot infested fecal matter might actually describe it better.

True.

this arc is Knightfall for Dummies